


Oranna and the Reflection

by Athena_Tiamat



Series: Oranna Stormbreaker [4]
Category: World of Warcraft
Genre: Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Gen, Physical Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-01
Updated: 2021-03-01
Packaged: 2021-03-13 11:34:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29775558
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Athena_Tiamat/pseuds/Athena_Tiamat
Summary: Oranna Stormbreaker takes a day to fish, and thinks about her family and about the members of Cobalt Company who she sees herself in.
Series: Oranna Stormbreaker [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2167098
Comments: 2
Kudos: 1





	Oranna and the Reflection

Oranna Stormbreaker stood alone with her snow leopard, and breathed in the frigid mountain air that stung her face with a wind that whipped her hair around her.

It had felt like she’d been suffocating, and this was the first clear breath she’d been able to take in days. The human lands were fascinating, and filled with wonders she had never considered before, but she was always too warm. The air was too heavy; it clung to her like the giant spider webs of Duskwood, pressing against her insistently.

Here, the air hurt her lungs, but it was a clean burn of chill, instead of so dry and hot that it stole the moisture from her mouth. She took another deep breath. At her side, Can’t Be Found huffed impatiently, stretching deliberately to catch Oranna’s eye.

“Aye, lass, I know, I’m goin’,” Oranna said affectionately. She shook her head, and looked out at the snowy mountains of Dun Morogh. The fishing pond was just a little to the west, past Khaz Modan. She began to walk down the steep road, and without needing a signal, Befound followed at her heels. The snow leopard had needed fewer and fewer cues from Oranna, and instead had begun to watch for the small motions the dwarven hunter made.

The fishing pond was really part of a lake. However, the lake was mostly frozen over this time of year with a thick sheet of ice that was safe to walk on, at least for a dwarf and her snow leopard. Closer to the shore, there was enough movement from the river to keep the ice from encasing the water, and it was there Oranna settled down to fish when she could.

Befound hopped to her usual spot, where she could watch the trees, and the little dramas that played out amongst the snow rabbits, rams, and occasional wolf pack. They never dared venture closer, but sometimes Befound would deliberately yawn in their direction, showing her deadly fangs. Oranna tried not to chuckle on those occasions, not wanting to offend the leopard’s sensibilities.

As Oranna put down her bucket, and sat down on the wooden pier, she caught sight of her reflection in the water. The water was unusually still, and despite the cold, the day was bright and sunny. It was wobbly, but there she was.

She sighed at the sight. The details were lost to the ripples in the water, but even without them she could see that she was a bit worn around the edges. The water didn’t show how she had dark circles under her eyes, or that the stress line in the middle of her forehead was more pronounced than ever. And she knew the water couldn’t show the way her eyes were haunted by her fears and the ghosts that stalked her mind, lurkers that waited patiently for her to walk into their webs. But, she knew they were there.

_“Ora, we need to go. We have to go. The gates are closing.”_

Oranna sat down, and stared up at the sky. It was impossibly blue, the way the Dun Morogh skies could get when they weren’t covered in a fluffy gray blanket of cloud that stretched as far as the eye could see. Her mother had hated sunny days like this. What was the point of a Stormbreaker on a sunny day, she’d ask. Oranna had never said what she’d thought privately to herself: what was the point of never stopping to enjoy the moment after a storm?

Her brothers had been forged in the same mold as her mother. Warriors, all of them, a line of four dwarven men who would hold their ground against any foe, and never flinch from duty. They had been honorable on the whole, but they had never understood how someone could be different from themselves. Oranna had been a surprise to her parents, who had assumed their parenting years were over. Her nearest brother in age had been 33 when she had been born, a full adult, and Oranna had grown up essentially an only child.

And now, she thought with a tight throat, she was one in true.

Oranna cast her line, and took a shaky breath. Her family had been just a thought away for the past week. It was not just Ironforge, which had stirred up memories regularly, but Cobalt Company. Or, at least, the members of it. They were not her family, in both the good and the bad ways, but they were important to her all the same.

She thought about Daine Atley. A warrior, like her brothers, that was where the similarities began and ended. He had a coarseness to him that Oranna understood, the kind of growly bristle that happens when an animal had been hurt and starved and seen the reflection of their death in the eyes of a larger predator one too many times. But, underneath it, she saw how much he thought of others. Even when he was getting his hackles up about disrespect for Sir Elohad, it came from a place of a person who knew the value of people who stood in front of others, and took on the burdens of command.

“Ye know, lass,” Oranna said conversationally to Befound, who quirked one ear to the hunter, but did not move, her eyes on the trees. “I ‘ad a brother like tha’ lad, Atley. Well, nae like, actually. Coperun wouldnae ha’ jus’ said tae listen carefully. That lad Atley, he talks a rough game, but ah dun think he’d hurt any single one o’ us in the Company. Not even those warlocks tha’ seem tae make him nervous, or grumpy, which is the same thin’ for men like him. I think the worst he’d do is hurt their ears yellin’.”

Oranna’s brother, Coperun, had been harsh when he ever suspected Oranna had not been showing her mother proper respect. Twice he’d hit her where other’s couldn’t see to “teach her a lesson about respect” when Oranna had spoken back to her mother.

_“If ye talk like tha’ again, I’ll leave ye bleedin’ in tha dirt.”_

He had been true to his word. She still had the tiny scars on her palms from where she’d hit the rough ground, the air knocked out of her from the blow. She’d been fourteen.

The fish pulled on the line, and Oranna steadily pulled back, reeling it in with a practiced hand. Coperun had been the one who had pushed Oranna back into Topa’s chest.

_“Go. Topa, take her. Get her out o’ here.”_

_She’s dizzy and can’t seem to catch her breath. She’s going to throw up again, and Topa’s hand is strong around her, dragging her away. Coperun turns away, and she can’t see his expression through her tears._

She still couldn’t be sure if he had done it to save her life because he loved her, or because he hadn’t considered Oranna a worthy comrade-in-arms to die beside. She would never know.

“Daine,” she said. “He doesn’t seem tae mind me, though I’ll be honest wi’ ye lass, I cannae always tell wi’ these humans. It’s hard tae see their faces in the heat ‘o battle, up so high.” Befound let out a yawn, and Oranna chuckled. The leopard wasn’t much shorter than her. It was true that when it came time to fire, Oranna couldn’t be bothered to watch her comrade’s expressions. She was more concerned with ensuring they weren’t in her scope, and that anything attacking them wouldn’t live to regret it. So, if he scoffed or rolled his eyes at every shot she missed, or when she was so focused on sighting down a target she didn’t see the murloc creeping up behind her, she never saw it.

He had spoken to her with kindness, and a gruff respect that touched her. Whatever his thoughts might be on other non-humans, he saw Oranna as a person. In battle, he pushed himself hard, going out of his way to take every blow on his own shield or his person, rather than let a single glancing strike land on his comrades. Even when he was bleeding, he would press on.

There was something in his manner in how Atley looked to Sir Elohad that reminded Oranna of how she had looked to her brothers. He had something to prove, motivated beyond kindness, from something personal. Somewhere, for some reason, Daine Atley had felt that he had somehow failed to measure up to expectations. She didn’t know if they had been another’s or his own, but he sought out approval from Sir Elohad the way someone does when they have trouble looking in the mirror, afraid to meet their own eyes. She knew how that felt. She did not linger in front of the mirror, herself.

The fish was a good one, a nice smallfish that Befound liked. With a swift slice, she ended the fish’s life. She knew that many preferred to let the fish die naturally, but she hated it, watching it suffer. She would swear that she could taste the difference. So, as she brought them in, she killed them quickly, a strike that killed instantly. This one she could feed to Befound.

“Here, lass, I ‘ave somethin’ fer ye,” she said to the leopard. Obediently, Befound turned her head to look at Oranna. The leopard looked at the fish in the hunter’s hand, but did not move to get it. “Good lass. Now, show me yer best growl,” Oranna said, using the hand motion for growl. Befound let out a loud growl that startled something nearby, running deeper into the bushes. “Verra good, lass, verra good.” Oranna tossed the fish at Befound, who caught it midair with a feline grace.

She recast the line. A pleasant breeze passed across the lake. She looked up, and saw a dwarf mountaineer passing by on the other side of the lake. She raised a hand in greeting, and the dwarf raised one in return. There was a small comfort in the familiarity of it. Here, it would be rare to see a human, which was a pleasant return to normalcy for Oranna, after being with the Company among the human lands where a dwarf was a rare sight.

A part of her had worried she would be the only non-human in the Company. She had readied herself for it, and had been immediately relieved to see that there were at least a few others. It was hard to explain how it felt knowing that she was not the smallest person in the room. Oranna looked to her shot pouch, and patted it gently, hearing the click of bullets made by the gnome Jocoza.

“Wha’ d’ye think o’ that lass Jo, hm?” She asked Befound, who was fastidiously licking her paws and swiping them across her face. Not a day past she had been chin deep in the intestines of a Defias member, blood coating her fur and dripping from her fangs. Oranna rolled her eyes, but she made sure the leopard wasn’t looking first. “I like her,” Oranna continued. There were times that the gnome made something in Oranna’s chest tighten like a vise, a grip of memory that hurt as much as it comforted.

“ _Do you have a place to go?” The voice is high pitched, but the gnome uttering the words is old, her eyes ringed by wrinkles, and her hair entirely gray with strands of pure white._

_She can’t breathe. Every time she tries to speak, her words get caught in the scream stuck in her throat. Topa rubs a hand up and down her arm._

_“No,” Topa says and the word is a blow of pain, a ram butting into her lungs._

_It’s final, it’s real, and they’re gone. Home is gone. Everyone is gone. She keens, her voice caught on the note of the scream._

_“Well then.” The gnome looks at Topa. “You do now. We’re going to Tinker Town. I have a place there, and now so do you.”_

“I saw a lot of the best of gnomes in the siege,” Oranna said to Befound. “But, ye know, tha’ lass is somethin’ special. She has one of those hearts that goes down so deep ye can’t see the bottom. She jus’ gives and gives, and ne’er asks for anythin’ in return.” Oranna sighed. She knew the type, and she knew the greatest danger to someone like that was that they would keep going even when they were empty, trying to help everyone, giving so much of themselves that they left little for their own needs.

Worse, Oranna knew that some people got like that, trying to help everyone, trying to keep everyone safe, after they lost someone, someone they couldn’t save. She knew it because she saw it in herself. She had spent a year of siege giving until she broke. It had taken a long time for her to put herself back together.

The line tugged with a strong yank, and Oranna braced herself. The fish gave her a bit of a fight, but Oranna was patient. Eventually, like all things, it would get tired and that was when Oranna began to reel it in earnestly. She pulled it up to the pier. A good sized Bristle Whisker Catfish. This one she would save. It would make several portions for Befound while they were on the go.

She recast the line. It caused ripples in the water, and Oranna looked at them, watching as they expanded. She took several deep breaths, feeling the pole a steady weight in her hands.

The pole was of simple make, and she wondered if Jocoza would have tinkered with it. In Oranna’s experience, all gnomes seemed to enjoy a bit of tinkering. But, few had the simple brilliance of Jocoza, who seemed to have both the gift of inventive genius as well as the much more rare restraint of practicality. Oranna enjoyed a good explosion as much as the next dwarf, but she needed good shot more than a bag of fireworks. Without even being asked, Jo had provided the shot, without adding fireworks to them. It was something that Oranna appreciated about the somewhat enigmatic gnome. It was clear the gnome was always thinking, but she did not always share her conclusions.

Once, it had been Oranna who had been inscrutable, her thoughts a mystery behind her dark brown eyes.

“Ye know, lass, I used tae be the quiet one,” Oranna said. Befound huffed in disbelief and Oranna let out a loud laugh. “I know. It’s true. I got used tae talkin’ when I was by myself, actually. I used tae talk to your, well, let’s call her yer big sister, Mywill. When I first got out there lass, I needed the quiet. It had been noise non-stop for a year, and I jus’ wanted it to go away.” She stopped and swallowed hard. “But, ye know, after a while the silence stops seemin’ a comfort. So, I started talkin’ to Mywill. She seemed to like it.” Befound purred gently, and Oranna reached a hand over, putting the pole between her knees for balance. The leopard butted her head against Oranna’s hand, and she scratched gently at the leopard’s ears.

“Been twenty some odd years of sayin’ jus’ abou’ e’ery thought in mae head, lass, and I can’t quite seem tae shake the habit.” She smiled, and gave the leopard one last pat before picking back up the pole. Befound settled back down to the ground, staring into the trees.

When she had been young, her mother had not wanted to hear the things Oranna said, especially when the matter of professions came up. And later, with great-aunt Nettie, it was a matter of proximity. Nettie did not like to be around people, and that included Oranna. If their interactions were kept brief, great-aunt Nettie could handle it, but too long and she would get a faraway look in her eyes, and she would fade out of the conversation. Oranna had learned to keep her thoughts to herself.

“Like tha’ lass, Cressidha,” Oranna remarked. “I worry abou’ her. She seems a right young lass, but it seems like she’s used tae bein’ o’erlooked, unless someone expects somethin’ from her. Noble, I think. I dun know much about human nobles, I’ll admit tae ye lass, but I know what it looks like when ye learn t’ jus’ be quiet, because ye know no one wants tae hear yer real thoughts.” Oranna liked the mage, whose eyes sometimes burned with a passion for her work, and for the adventure of the Company. She did not think the human woman had ever just laughed spontaneously, throwing back her head and laughing with her whole body, even once before in her life. Oranna knew the look, and knew that a twenty-something Oranna would have looked exactly like the young noble woman.

“But, ye know, she is so kind, tha’ lass. Ye can tell she cares, even if she can’t say it much. She’s thoughtful, and she seems tae know jus’ how tae take care o’ e’eryone she sees.” Befound purred, and Oranna sighed. “And ye have tae stop sniffin’ around her. She doesn’t always have clam meat in her pockets, ye know.” Befound laid her head on the ground in a pose of feline pique.

The line went taut, but instead of successfully pulling back a fish, the line broke.

“Dahym,” Oranna cursed. She reached into her bag and pulled out a new lure. She lifted the pole into her lap, and began to fiddle with it, fixing the line and reattaching the new lure.

Sometimes things just broke under a strain. It was something Oranna knew well, and it was a danger she was keen to in others, especially those who had never been tried against their breaking point before.

“We’ve got tae keep an eye on those two,” Oranna said to Befound. The leopard cocked an ear at Oranna’s words. “Those young uns, Ivri and Sandy. Now those are two who have ne’er had anythin’ truly test their mettle.” There were times when Gausanders was out that Oranna found herself choked with fear that something would happen to him. He had a face that reminded Oranna of her father’s wolfhound, Up Is Down, who had been an affectionate creature, but did not have the sense the Light gave little apples, as her father used to say.

He was impulsive, in the way that would only last until the first thing that truly hurt him permanently, if he even survived it. “I don’t know why, but I like the lad,” Oranna remarked to the leopard. There was an easy affection to the young human boy, an openness that often did not survive contact with the real world, and rather than see him hardened with skepticism and wariness, she wanted to see him hold onto it as long as he could. No one in her family had been allowed to have that sort of playfulness, except for Up. Oranna had been like that once, when she was very young. It had not lasted very long.

_“Get yer head o’ of the clouds, or I’ll put ye face in the dirt.”_

She was not ready to see that same glow snuffed out in the human boy.

“The lass on the other hand, I’m more worried about what will happen when she’s jus’ nae fast enough one day.” Oranna looked out across the lake. The young human woman had learned how to trust in her instincts, and her skills, which were considerable. But, it was clear to Oranna that the human girl had never once seen them fail in a way that cost her something she held dear.

_She’s celebrating with the others, beer after beer, laughing. They’ve beaten the orcs at every turn! She gulps down more beer, some spilling out of the corners. She’s cheering and laughing. The orcs will never take Dun Morogh. Never. They are invincible._

_“Ora! Wake up!”_

_She’s waking in horror. There are screams in the air. The orcs are upon them. They came in the night. She can’t see, her eyes are blurry, her head is pounding. She retches and vomits over her sleeping pack, and her brother Malkah scowls. She can’t even stand without help._

_“You won’t be any use. Get to the other side of camp, now.” He pushes her, and she sways, more vomit pooling in her mouth._

Oranna closed her eyes to the memory. It was hard to think of it, as she felt the residual ache of queasiness in her stomach, the painful press of talons against her belly. She had accepted a long time ago that even if she had been at her peak, she alone would not have stopped the orcs that day.

_“Go. Topa, take her. Get her out o’ here.”_

She had never been able to accept that she only lived to tell the tale because she had been too hung over to stand beside her family as they died.

Someday, Oranna thought, Ivrianna would not be enough. It was just the way of the world. There was always something bigger and stronger and more determined to cause harm. Oranna just hoped that when that day came, she was there to help Ivrianna put herself back together again. There was a well of kindness beneath the bravado the girl wore like an armor as shiny and bright as the ones her brothers must wear. Oranna knew that kind of armor, the kind that a young girl grew when she refused to walk in the same footsteps of her family.

_“A warrior doesn’t flinch from a little pain.”_

_“Then maybe I don’t want to be a warrior!”_

_The gasps of her mother and aunt, and the murmurs of her brothers. Everyone looking at her with various degrees of pity and scorn. Her mother steeling herself, her hand chopping through the air with her words, leaving no room for argument._

_“That’s ridiculous. All Stormbreakers are warriors!”_

_Her eyes burning with unspent tears. The sword and shield thrown to the ground._

_“Then maybe I’m not a Stormbreaker!”_

_Her mother’s fist coming at her face, and then she’s on the ground next to the sword and shield, head ringing, mouth filling with blood._

“We’ve got her back, don’t we, lass?” Oranna knew her voice shook a little. Befound let out the little rolling chirp she only made when they were alone, when she was worried about the hunter. Oranna shook her head. “I’m all right, lass. Just some ghosts talkin’ loud today.” She recast the line with a sigh.

Oranna avoided thinking about her mother most days. Irona Stormbreaker had been a strong woman, in more ways than one. For a long time, she had been the stick Oranna had used to measure herself and all others against. It had taken a long time for her to realize that her mother’s strength was a hard strength, the strength of diamonds, impervious to harm, but capable of harming others with its strength. Irona had ruled her household with a diamond grip, allowing for nothing that could be thought of as weakness, and everyone was assumed to be weaker than Irona. It was what Oranna had thought leadership was. Until the siege of Ironforge, where she had seen so many different types of leading.

_“You there, lass! Can you fire a gun?” She can’t take her eyes off the dwarf, staring sightlessly at the ceiling. Hands shake her roughly. “Lass!”_

_She meets the eyes of dwarf who can’t be much older than her. His voice is hoarse from yelling. He’s desperate. Her hands are shaking, the basket filled with bandages that she was delivering hits the ground._

_“Yes.”_

_“Then, please, lass, please.” He shoves the gun into her hands. It’s nothing like Great-aunt Nettie’s gun, but the principles seem the same. “Hold this spot.” He moves the body of the dwarf with a quiet sob, and she takes the dead dwarf’s place._

_“Don’t let them take more o’ us.” It’s a prayer. She doesn’t know if he’s talking to the Light or to her, but she braces against the ledge and sights down the scope._

_She won’t._

Now, there was Sir Elohad, the leader of Cobalt Company. There was nothing hard about him, even though it was clear there was a core of strength that held steady within him. Oranna had never seen someone lead the way he did. It was obvious from every single interaction with the human man that he cared deeply about each and every member of the Company, simply for being willing to do their part. He listened to them, and considered their words as though he weighed them equal to his own opinions. Even when he lost patience, it was with firmness rather than unkindness. She could see that he had a bit of a temper, but it was often provoked by things that might cause the Company harm, even from within through inattention, and Oranna understood that.

“We do have a fine leader, don’t we,” she said. The leopard huffed as if to say that a real fine leader would have more boar meat on him. Oranna resisted rolling her eyes. “But there’s somethin’ sad in him, isn’t there? When he thought that the Company might have grabbed the tiger by the tail, he was ready to have the rest of us let go while he held it off.”

Oranna knew that compulsion. She knew what it was to feel like you would rather die alone than go down fighting watching everyone go down with you, or worse, that their deaths would see your own survival. She did not know who or what had happened to the human man, but she knew that he carried ghosts of his own. They called out to her own in that familiar way that ghosts had, and they lingered in the edges of his eyes even when he smiled.

_“Ora, we need to go. We have to go. The gates are closing.”_

_The icy jolt of fear in her veins. The afterimages of the explosion still showing black spots in her vision. A pit of horror opening inside her belly, a scream she could not catch her breath long enough to cast out of her. The taste of beer and vomit._

_“Ora! They’re already gone. We need to go.”_

_Topa pulling her away. Her vision is blurred and her head is pounding so hard she can feel the beat of her heart pulsing in her eyes. Topa’s single arm comes around her, trying to contain the shaking._

_She is shaking apart, like the bridge. It’s gone, and there is no way to reach the other side, where her family is dying, bleeding out, and they are screaming. Every step takes her away from them, to safety, while they bleed._

The line went taut and Oranna sighed, pushing aside the memory. This one reeled in easy, and she could tell it would be small, a simple Longjaw Mud Snapper. Good for handing over to Befound for sitting and staying so well. She tossed the fish to Befound, who ate it without visible relish. They were not her favorite, but the leopard had lived long enough on her own that she knew how to eat food when it was there.

The light grew dim, and Oranna frowned, looking up. The sun had gone behind a cloud. A fast moving cloud, dark gray and rolling. A storm cloud, it would seem. Oranna looked at the catfish, and measured the benefits of staying out and getting more fish to getting caught out in the storm.

_“A Stormbreaker does not run from a storm!”_

“This one does,” Oranna muttered aloud to the ghost of her mother’s voice.

Decision made, she pulled out the paper she kept for fish from her pack, and made quick work of the filleting. She would not bother preserving the fish, but Befound could have it for dinner and treat later, in a few servings after working on her commands for leaving Oranna’s gloves alone.

Oranna stood up, and collected her things, wiping her hands on a spare rag. Without needing a signal, Befound stood with her, moving to her side automatically. Oranna looked down at the water, still relatively undisturbed, even as she felt the wind picking up behind her. She was able to make out her reflection, a dwarf woman staring back at her from the water.

A woman who never measured up to her family’s expectations, and then became the last one standing.

A woman who had given until she was empty, and then had become capable of surviving the giving.

A woman who learned how to be quiet, and then learned how to be loud.

A woman who once saw the world with soft eyes, and now used her hardened sight to protect others.

A woman who had not been enough, and who had come back willing to try again.

A woman who had lost everything, and who had found new things to lose.

A woman who had learned that surest path through the world was best paved with kindness.

Her mother had always said that you could tell a lot about a person by looking at their family. People are a product of who they came from, for better or worse, Irona Stormbreaker had maintained. Oranna often wondered what her mother would think about what that said about Oranna, unmoored from her family ties, the last of her line.

“Let’s go home, lass.” Oranna Stormbreaker, dwarven hunter of Cobalt Company, set her head against the wind and took a deep breath of cold mountain air.

The Stormbreakers were gone. But Cobalt Company was not. And they were becoming as much a part of Oranna as she was becoming one of the Company, reflections of who she had been, who she was, and who she wanted to be.


End file.
